Donald Trump bigs up Dubai’s airport during an interview with CNN.

With his talk of closing US borders to Muslims, Presidential hopeful Donald Trump’s anti-Islam rhetoric has been well documented, but yesterday while talking to Anderson Cooper during a CNN debate he had some praise for the Muslim world – more specifically, the beauty of Doha and Dubai’s airports.

How the property mogul got to discussing our airports was a bit convoluted – a member of the public stood up and asked “Why can’t Donald Trump be more like his sons?”. The woman asking the question went on to ask Trump if he “could look at his sons as an example of being less reactionary”.

Trump, who has development projects in Dubai, began his answer by talking about his children, calling them “stars” with “great attitude”, saying that they are “very strong”. He then said that his children want him to be President because they believe he’ll – and here he invoked his campaign’s slogan – “Make America Great Again.”

*READ MORE: You’ll now have to pay a fee every time you fly out of Dubai*

That’s how he got onto DXB International. “Look at what the world is doing to us at every level… the world is literally driving us into being a third world nation. Anderson, I travel all over the world and I land at airports the likes of which you’ve never seen, whether it’s in Qatar or Dubai or places in China, the likes of which you have never seen. And then we come home and land in La Guardia with potholes all over the place … and you look at what we have and where we’ve gone. It’s time to rebuild our country.”

Here’s a video clip showing the talk…

This is very similar to a speech Trump gave back in August 2015, during which he said…

“Take a look at our infrastructure. Our roads are crumbling, our airports are third world. You go to Qatar, you go to Dubai, you go to places in China and places in the Middle East and they have airports that are the most beautiful I’ve seen in my life. I was in Qatar and I was given a tour, they were showing me the most incredible airport I’ve ever seen and I said ‘this is great, congratulations.’ And they say ‘No, no, no this is temporary, our real airport is over there’, and he then points across the runway and they must have more than 75 cranes and it was the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen… and then we come back to La Guardia. “

*MORE: Dubai Police Chief warns of danger of Donald Trump win*

Here’s some Twitter reaction to Dubai’s airport chat…

TRUMP’S ANTI-ISLAM STATEMENTS

donald-trump

2011

In a 2011 interview, Trump said this: “The Quran is very interesting. A lot of people say it teaches love… But there’s something there that teaches some very negative vibe… Now I don’t know if that’s from the Quran. I don’t know if that’s from someplace else. But there’s tremendous hatred out there that I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Early December 2015

Late last year he propagated what’s widely considered to be a myth about uninhabitable areas of Paris: “If you look at Paris [it’s] no longer the same city it was. They have sections in Paris which are radicalised where they police refuse to go there because they’re petrified. We have places in London and other places that are so radicalised the police are afraid for their own lives. We have to be very smart and very vigilant.”

Late December 2015

In December he called for the ban of all Muslims travelling to the United States, this led Dubai-based Landmark group to pull all Donald Trump products from their shelves. It also called into question the businessman’s ongoing relationship with Dubai-based developer Damac (which appears to be continuing on as normal for now).

The media statement began with: “Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.”

It then quoted him as saying: “Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in Jihad, and have no sense of reason or respect for human life.”

March 2015

After last week’s attacks in Brussels, Republican Presidential hopeful Donald Trump tweeted, “Incompetent Hillary, despite the horrible attack in Brussels today, wants borders to be weak and open-and let the Muslims flow in. No way!”

OTHER GCC REACTIONS TO TRUMP

trumpDonald Trump at a press conference this month. 

Prince Alwaleed bin Talal

The multi-billionaire Saudi prince expressed his feeling toward the controversial frontrunner for the Republican nomination on Twitter: “You are a disgrace not only to the GOP [Republican Party] but to all America.” Adding: “Withdraw from the US presidential race as you will never win.”

Trump responded with: “Dopey Prince @Alwaleed_Talal wants to control our U.S. politicians with daddy’s money. Can’t do it when I get elected.”

Read more about that here.

Khalaf Al Habtoor

The prominent UAE businessman has provided words of support for Trump in the past, but it seems his closing borders stunt is a step too far.

Al Habtoor told CNN: “I view him as the biggest enemy of Islam. He is a man supporting ISIS… he is encouraging them, this is what they want to hear.”

Landmark

The retail giant behind Splash, Centrepoint, Home Centre, Iconic, Emax and many other stores, has removed all Trump Home products from their 195 Lifestyle stores across the Middle East due to his anti-Islam statements. Read more about that here.

Dubai Police Chief

dahi khalfan tamim

Lt. Gen. Dahi Khalfan Tamim, the deputy chairman of police and general security in Dubai, took to Twitter to warn that there would be a “clash of civilizations” if Trump won – which references political scientist Samuel P. Huntington’s theory that future wars in the world will be fought between religious and cultural divides rather than country lines.